City officials: Initiative against fracking could clash with state law

Some Denton City Council
members see a likely collision between state law and a citizens initiative to
ban hydraulic fracturing inside the city.

A group of Denton residents
will launch a petition drive at 6:30 p.m. Thursday at Sweetwater Grill &
Tavern. Beginning that day, the group will have 180 days to gather 571
signatures to force the council’s consideration of a fracking ban.

The oil and gas industry has
seen a surge in production after bringing fracking — pressure-pumping a
chemical-and-water solution to extract oil and gas — to wells drilled in rock
formations such as the Barnett Shale, in western Denton and Denton County.

Council member Jim
Engelbrecht, whose district is among the most affected by a recent campaign to
reinvigorate some of the 270 old wells in Denton, said he can understand why
residents are frustrated.

He shares their frustration.
He’s voted twice against the “standstill agreement” that has allowed EagleRidge
Energy to continue drilling and fracking wells in neighborhoods in his district
while city leaders try to negotiate with the company.

The city dropped a lawsuit it
filed trying to enforce its ordinance, and has been negotiating with the
company under a standstill agreement set to expire March 4.

Council member Kevin Roden
said he was certain the citizens group would get the required number of
signatures.

“Citizens don’t think their
concerns are being heard,” Roden said.

But he thought it was too
early to speculate on what the future holds. He said he hopes the initiative
highlights the city’s concerns about oil and gas development and provides the
impetus for other solutions.

Council member James King
agreed, adding that the initiative process is an important option for
residents, but he sees a clash between local will and state law.

“I don’t know what would
happen to our city in Texas,” King said. “I have no idea.”

Council member Dalton Gregory
said he would have pushed for a ban on fracking when the city was revising its
oil and gas development ordinance if he thought it would have worked.

The initiative has a small
chance to be successful, he said, but he was concerned that defending it could
get expensive for the city.

Colorado state officials
joined a lawsuit by a trade association against the city of Longmont after it
banned fracking. Residents in other Colorado cities have since passed
long-term, local moratoriums, and groups are organizing a statewide initiative
to affirm the authority of local governments to make such regulations.

Cory Pomeroy, vice president
and general counsel for the Texas Oil and Gas Association, said city officials
are wise to question whether a ban would be legally defensible.

“Several companies are
currently operating in Denton with permits issued by the city,” Pomeroy wrote
in an e-mail. “A post-development ban would compromise valid agreements between
oil and natural gas operators and the city of Denton.”

Ed Ireland, executive
director of the Barnett Shale Energy Education Council and one of industry’s
representatives on the task force that helped develop Denton’s oil and gas
ordinance, said that, at first read, he saw the citizens’ attempt not as a ban
on drilling but on hydraulic fracturing.

“It’s been a legal activity,”
Ireland said. “I think a ban on hydraulic fracturing is beyond the authority of
a municipality.”

Ireland said in Texas the
regulation of well completion techniques, of which fracking is one, lies with
the Texas Railroad Commission.

Ed Longanecker, president of
the Texas Independent Producers and Royalty Owners Association, said in a prepared
statement that royalty owners are deprived of income in places where people
protest oil and gas development.

“We are experiencing an
energy revolution in the state of Texas and across the country, which is why we
must capitalize on the opportunity that has been presented to us in a
responsible and transparent manner,” he wrote. “Anyone can find the truth and
easily dispel the myths being presented by some.”

PEGGY HEINKEL-WOLFE can be
reached at 940-566-6881 and via Twitter at @phwolfeDRC.

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